For the past few weeks, much of the discussion surrounding USC football has surrounded the quarterback position. The UCLA football rivalry game offered a fascinating plot twist connected to big-play passing for the Trojans.
Following the loss to Washington, head coach Lincoln Riley elected to bench starter Miller Moss in favor of UNLV transfer Jayden Maiava. Through two games, the move has shown mixed results. Maiava has not exactly lit the world on fire, but he has played well enough for the Trojans to defeat both Nebraska and UCLA.
On Saturday night at the Rose Bowl, USC’s biggest play of the game was indeed a pass. It just wasn’t thrown by Maiava.
Midway through the third quarter, the Trojans trailed 13-9, and had not been able to get much going offensively. So Riley decided to pull one out of his bag of tricks.
Facing second down and 4 at the UCLA 43 yard line, Maiava took the snap and threw a backwards screen to wide receiver Makai Lemon. Lemon caught the ball and dropped back to pass himself, delivering a 39-yard dart to Ja’Kobi Lane, setting USC up with first and goal at the UCLA 4.
If the play looked at all familiar to you, that’s likely because the New England Patriots pulled off a similar trick nearly a decade ago in the AFC Divisional Playoffs against the Baltimore Ravens, with former college QB Julian Edelman playing the role of Lemon.
Following Lemon’s big throw, the Trojans punched the ball into the end zone on the next play to take a lead that they would not relinquish the rest of the night.
The play had a huge outcome on USC’s win probability. Prior to Lemon’s double pass, the Trojans had just a 37.6% chance to win the game, per ESPN analytics. After that play, it jumped to 58.6%.
We will never know what would have happened in the game had the trick play not been successful. But given how poorly the Trojans’ offense had looked prior, it was undeniably their most important one of the night.
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